


Polendina

by WoozySloth



Category: Digimon - All Media Types, Digimon Adventure
Genre: Ambiguity, Anonymity, Birthday, Creation, Deleted Scenes, Gen, Headcanon, Horror, Origin Story, Puppets, whittling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-17 01:48:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21046298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WoozySloth/pseuds/WoozySloth
Summary: Out in the Deep Forest, a mysterious figure takes up an unexpected hobby.





	Polendina

The body of tree remained mostly intact and unspoilt, despite its clearly advanced age. But this majority only served to highlight the poisonously unhealthy looking parts of the behemoth. Glowing lines of static hissed and buzzed along its trunk. Randomly, small sections of the tree would disintegrate, or become rotten in only a moment, the same way a light switches on. Other parts of the tree seemed to bleed.

The woodworker carved away at the static and the wood as if they were one and the same, and it did not seem to matter which their blade ran over, the results were identical.

Something about this tree, or perhaps the way the woodworker took to the tree, made it seem pitiful. Perhaps it was the age of it, the size, the grandeur, that gave it the feeling of having suffered an untimely expiration. Or that it seemed, somehow, as if it should have been left to rot (well, disintegrate, then be reborn).

Perhaps it was the moustache.

Or the way that the face behind that moustache was frozen in pain and fear.

Or the _scrape, scrape, scrape _of the woodworker's blade.

"Do you _have_ to do that?"

The woodworker paused, placing pinky fingertip to painted lip, humming thoughtfully. The blade protruded from their hand at a jaunty angle. On closer inspection, it was not exactly a knife, of the whittling variety or otherwise. It was constructed exactly like a double-edged sword, with a heart motif hilt for flavour, on the scale of one of the woodworker's own long, spindly fingers.

"Weeeeell," began the woodworker, "I suppose I don't_ have_ to. None of this is really _necessary. _But it makes for an entertaining diversion, no?"

"By 'diversion', are you referring to this undertaking in particular, or your whole plan?"

The woodworker tittered. Then went back to work.

_Scrape, scrape, scrape._

Shavings of wood, and hissing static in the shape of wood-shavings, fell to the forest floor.

The woodworker gathered them up in what might better be called a claw than a hand. With a delicacy that belied their size, long digits began to wind the shavings and chips over and under, again and again, until they formed a tight ball.

Gently, the woodworker cradled this little ball in his large, bone-white palm, rolling it around, gently brushing it with his thumb.

Then the claw contracted into a fist and squeezed.

From within that tightly clenched fist, light seeped out, with such intensity that even to look at it seemed to burn.

The woodworker's fist and arm began to shake, as if the ball was trying to escape its prison with a sudden and terrible ferocity.

The woodworker brought his fist up, closer and closer to painted lips, as if about to bestow a kiss.

Instead, there was the barest of whispered breaths blown onto it. The light went out.

One by one, thin white fingers uncurled, revealing an eye.

The eye, for its part, was moving its red iris wildly around the Deep Forest, refusing to settle. This movement only became more frantic as the eye found itself grasped tightly between two fingers, and held over the woodworker's smiling face.

"Now, for my next trick..."

The woodworker opened his mouth and dropped the eye into his wide maw. Then he began to chew, loudly, messily, slurping and slobbering. 

_Gulp._

For a moment, the woodworker was silent and still. 

Then, with great ceremony, the bridge of his black and white mask was pinched, and the woodworker began to blow, hard.

Their whole body seemed to heave with the effort - if the woodworker had any blood to speak of, it would have surely flooded his chalk-coloured cheeks with red.

Then he jerked sharply, as a red eye came flying out of _each _pointed ear.

"Ta-da!" 

The woodworker bowed.

From behind, blue ribbons snaked around their form to present the newly duplicated (and freshly caught) eyes.

"Oh!" Gasped the woodworker, "for me?"

The ribbons bobbed up and down.

"You shouldn't have," the woodworker demurred, gracefully accepting the two orbs.

One of the ribbons twisted around and down into the woodworker's bright green jodhpurs.

"Oh my!" Giggled the woodworker. "Oh, but you _really _shouldn't!"

Quickly removing itself, the ribbon brought out a handkerchief.

"Ohhh," the woodworker sheepishly took the handkerchief from the ribbon, placing it over the eyes. With a flourish, the handkerchief was removed, leaving in their place a tiny keychain with an adorable pair of miniature red eyes attached.

"Be a dear and hold these for me, would you?" The woodworker said, holding the keychain out to the other, eagerly 'nodding' ribbon. The woodworker then turned their attention back to the dead tree.

"...is everything going to take that long?"

Silence. The woodworker idly twirled the tiny sword between their fingers.

"Ohohoho, you dear thing." The sword began to spin faster though the woodworker seemingly wasn't exerting himself any more. "Hasn't anyone told you patience is a virtue?"

The sword was a blur between fingers, but the blur seemed to get bigger and bigger, now the size of cleaver, now a shortsword for a human, now perhaps taller than any 'sensible' looking sword on Earth, and it began to slow down as it finally became the great and gleaming blade it was clearly meant to be, long as the woodworker's own spindly arms, which in themselves stretched from high shoulders to bright yellow shoes. There were other blades in the curious cross section of scabbards on the woodworker's back that were identical to the one in his hands and to each other, save for their hilts - each was modelled after a different suit of cards.

The long blade seemed to quiver in anticipation, ready to jump out of the clawed hand that held it. The woodworker grinned, raised the sword high in the air - 

And screamed.

It was a sound that was high and low, like the scream of a spoiled child and the scream of tires as the brakes engage too late. The scream of a trapped animal and a warrior charging the enemy with bloody and glorious purpose. 

There were many voices and one screaming out as the woodworker hacked at the tree, arms flailing in the air without a shred of technique or dignity. Great chunks of wood, data, static, even blood seemed to flow from the tree as the sword bit and tore at it, into it.

The image, the tableau, seemed to fade and skip.

Then there was a hiss, a snap, like the changing of a channel, and the terrible screaming stopped.

The woodworker was sitting cross-legged, slowly chipping away at one of the blocks, humming.

The rough edges were stripped and hewn away and evntually this misshapen block was replaced with a smooth sphere of polished wood.

Carefully, tongue poking out from between ruby red lips, the woodworker stabbed the small blade into the orb, moving it up and down in a jagged line. Two circles were carved out above this line, then poked out, leaving two perfect holes.

The tiny sword was placed between the line and these holes, and it began to spin, burrowing in and leaving a tiny pinprick of an opening.

The woodworker waited. And waited.

And waited...

With a huff, he put an eye to the tiny hole, only to leap back with a laugh as out popped a spinning drill.

"Oh, you clever thing!"

The drill slowed and stopped, revealing that it was no longer a sword, but a thin metal pole divided into extendable sections. 

One of the ribbons floated past this new appendage, taking the time to wind around and caress it on the way, as the woodworker pried open the jagged opening. Into this hole the ribbon deposited the eye-keychain, the woodworker snapping the 'jaw' shut.

Like a bartender preparing a cocktail, the woodworker shook and shook, hearing the tiny eyes rattle around inside. Then he held the head above, in one outstretched hand.

"Alas..."

Fully sized again, each eye rolled into place in the two perfect circles, slotting in as if meant to be there.

The white eyes of the woodworker's mask met the red eyes he had created.

The red pair blinked. Somehow.

"I didn't see you make any eyelids..."

Smiling, the woodworker put one hand under the 'chin' of his creation, moving it up and down.

"Oh, but in this world, _anything _is possible. All your dreams can come true!"

"A dream of...eyelids. Or blinking without eyelids?"

"Aaaanything."

Turning the head around, for a head was what it was, the woodworker put one finger on the side of the metal excuse for a nose. Then he flicked its side, setting it off on a powerful, buzzing spin.

Time moves differently in the Digital World, particularly in places where the woodworker stakes his claim. Into the air burst sawdust and data particles. If one were to be distracted by these appearing clouds, if their gaze was drawn into the air even for half a second, then by the time they looked down they would find formerly rough and raw chunks of wood shaped into definite forms. Even watching, it was hard to tell whether it took minutes, hours, or days, as the woodworker delicately moved their rough 'instrument' around each block, forming

The woodworker placed these thick sticks, bolted and banded together with metal, all slotted in to a larger stump. One might wonder where the metal had come from, but would note the absence of swords on the woodworkers' formerly occupied scabbards.

What was left was a wooden figure about the size of a child - perhaps it was this comparison that made the woodworker frown, just a bit.

The woodworker _hated_ children.

Again, a finger was placed on the jaw.

"Hey!" A whiny, childish voice protested, "I'm freezing out here!"

"Oh!" Cried the woodworker. "My darling boy, you must speak to me with more respect!"

"Huh? Why'd I wanna do that?"

"Why my dear, don't you know a child should speak to their Father more kindly?"

"Father?" The word was a foreign one to this world, for the most part - the Monsters that lived here did not know of parents the same way their material counterpart did.

"Yes child, I gave you eyes to see, a mouth to talk, hands with which to batter and beat your enemies. Relating to your last question, I'm also responsible for..." the woodworkers long arms began to grab behind him, where his blue ribbons had taken to darting around, shaking, trying to ignore the pursuit of his claws.

"...the clothes on your back." 

But the woodworker's arms were too quick and flexible, bending in strange angles and directed by purpose independent of their dark master's sight. One ribbon was grasped, writhing, as the other ribbon weakly beat at its fellows captor, as it was stretched and pulled and -

_Riiiiip._

The ribbon continued to struggle as it was brought forward, as it was wrapped around the small carved body. Its struggles became fiercer as it started to warp in shape and colour, splitting apart to form straps over the shoulders, ripped coverings around the tops of each leg. 

Each foot was brought up and inspected and judged to be as good as any boot. But on seeing the uncovered hands, the woodworker grasped the white ruff around his neck, ripped it in two, and wrapped them round and round these exposed appendages. By the time the woodworker's hands came away, what had been shredded cloth had transformed into fitted white gloves. Seemingly satisfied, the woodworker stepped back to admire his handiwork.

Then he gasped.

"But my boy, you're bald as an egg!"

"Huh? Well, I want hair! Lots of hair! Like yours!"

The woodworker ran a hand through his red and yellow hair, which erupted from the back of his head like a flaming volcano.

"Hmmm, I suppose I could spare _some, _but...how about a little obfuscation instead?"

"Obvious what?"

Chuckling, the woodworker reached up to to his right shoulder, where his red garment puffed out and bulged, stamped with a design that was somehow both spade and skull.

Grasping it, the woodworker heaved and ripped this bulge from his body, leaving nothing connecting his right arm to his body.

The arm remained floating in the air, seemingly unconcerned with the blank space between itself and the woodworker's neck.

Gracelessly, the woodworker smacked this red mass down onto the bald wooden head, grinding it down with the strength of both arms, connected or not.

"Yeeowch! Easy there Pops!"

"Fashion, my boy," the woodworker grunted as he kneaded away, "doesn't come without certain sacrifices."

Stepping back, the woodworker looked down at what was now a red cloth falling down over the eyes, a yellow skull/hazard symbol proudly emblazoned on it in place of the silver skull/spade. Pulling it up from the red eyes, the woodworker tied it all back for the cloth to sit perfectly.

"Voilà!"

"Eh, that's nice n' all, but I can't really strut it around."

"Why, whatever do you - oh! Silly me."

The woodworker took the empty crossed scabbards from his back and held the strange construct above his head. With no effort, he placed a finger directly in the centre of the cross, where it balanced without even the slightest wobble. Another finger came up, touched one extension of the cross and set the whole thing to spinning with the slightest touch. 

The scabbards spun faster and faster, till they were just a blur in the air, till even their colour couldn't be determined, till the winds from its spin lifted and whirled all the leaves and wood and sawdust in an unconventional ballet.

"Hmm."

The finger balancing the scabbard (or scabbards, it depended on your perspective really) came down to rest on the woodworker's chin. Unperturbed by this retraction of support, the blurred cross continued to spin in the air, otherwise not moving an inch.

"Ah, yes." Reaching back, the woodworker grabbed a handful of fiery hair and pulled, yanking out great clumps.

Twirling the strands into four tiny lassos, the woodworker threw each one into the spinning cross, though whether they latched on to anything was an educated guess - nothing could truly be determined through the blur of motion.

With a movement like a snake, an arm lashed out and stopped the cross dead. Four red strings hung in the air for a moment, then began to snake their way down to the prone mannequin, finding little hooks and holes to attach themselves to.

Their origin, the scabbard-cross, was now smaller and made of wood. Lifting it, the woodworker twitched, bringing the marionette to life.

"Oh, hey, that's better."

"A-hem."

"Uhhh, thanks."

"..."

"...dad?"

"Better."

The woodworker moved the marionette this way and that, letting it take in their surroundings.

"Hey, can I only move like this."

"Of course not," scoffed the woodworker, "look." 

He dropped the control bar, and the child fell limply to the ground.

The woodworker waited. And waited. Began to tap a yellow pointed toe. Then he smacked his head.

"Oh!" 

From within a voluminous red sleeve, the woodworker pulled a glowing yellow orb, dangling on a keychain.

"What's that?"

"This, my boy, is a digicore, which I'm afraid I forgot you, ah, need. To live and such."

"Oh. Cool."

"Mm, yes. 'Cool'. Even cooler, _this _digicore comes from one of the Digimon Sovereigns."

"The who?"

"No, the Digimon Sovereigns. I'm not even sure they have a band."

"The what?"

The woodworker sighed. "The Four Holy Beasts? I suppose that is the more proper term, here anyway."

"The huh?"

"Oh, never mind. What's special about _this _particular Holy Beast, aside from its astounding ability to talk to itself - "

"Hypocrite."

"Shush! What's special about this, aha, glorious protector of this digital world is that he, or they, supposedly used to be an Orochimon. Orochimon have a very specific vice, my boy. Vices are so very hard to shake, you know, even when one has supposedly _evolved _beyond them. Just ask the Maleficent Seven."

"Eh?"

"If you know Orochimon..."

"I don't."

"I know you don't, but if you did, you'd know that they have a very particular weakness."

"A weakness?"

"Mmhm. A weakness for, ah," here the woodworker winked one blank eye, "milkshakes."

"...Milkshakes?"

"Inside joke. Or outside joke, I suppose. But anyway, unlike Orochimon, a goodly amount of milkshakes resulted in a _godly_ amount of sleep. And here we are!"

The woodworker jangled the keychain, sending flashes of light all around.

"Now, ladies and gentlemen, we are nearing the end of our show," the woodworker brought the chain up to his lips, obscuring it with his hand. He brought his mouth up to the hand and blew, and as he blew the orb expanded to about the size of an apple.

This newly apple-sized digicore was brought up to the woodworker's lips, and was bestowed a wet _smack _of a kiss.

Where the woodworker's red lip mark was, the orb hissed and smoked.

Sitting down and cradling the little wooden head in his lap, the woodworker cooed.

"I'm no blue fairy, but I think this should do."

The smoking digicore fell down into the crooked mouth, light disappearing into the darkness. The mouth closed, to hide the light forevermore.

_Gulp._

The eyes blinked as if surprised at the sound the rest of the body had made.

The hands rose up, twisting this way and that.

The eyes looked up and up, into the face of the woodworker.

And at the woodworker's hands, nowhere near the control bar.

The eyes blinked again.

"Holy crap!"

The puppet jumped up all at once, limbs flying into an order that could support it, as the woodworker laughed.

"It's aliiiiive!"

Standing up himself, the woodworker brushed himself. He waved his hand in the air, and the all the debris that had peeled off from the tree scattered in all directions, as the tree itself finally disappeared.

From the air, a single cherry fell into the woodworker's outstretched palm.

"What was that?" Asked the puppet, as the woodworker popped the cherry in his mouth.

"Oh, no one important. Not like _you_."

The puppet inspected its hands. "I'm important?" 

"Oh my, yes. You and I have some most important work to do."

The woodworker, shoulder gone, hair a mess, clothes in tatters, strolled off further into the Deep Forest. Behind him, not knowing what else to do, the puppet followed.

Together, they disappeared into the darkness of the trees.

Faintly, from within these unfathomable depths, a question could barely be heard.

"Will it be fun?"

**  
END**

**...**

(The following two extracts are from the 'Digimon Reference Book')

_Built from the body of a cursed Jyureimon, it is an Ultimate Puppet Digimon...It has an appearance like a marionette, but it can move under its own volition._

_A strange-looking and elusive Demon Man Digimon that is completely shrouded in mystery. Demon Man Digimon have many mysterious qualities, and since Demon- and Undead-species are basically beings from another dimension, their true forms are not totally understood. Why it appeared, and the purpose of its existence are also unclear, and there are currently no means of clarifying those questions._

**Author's Note:**

> There's no tag for "Mysterious/Ambiguously Present Third Speaker". Pretend there is.


End file.
